What

You really have done a great job with these! Keep up the good work.

Have any of you guys read my thread on the topic? LarvaHunter, are you going to post up pics anytime soon?

I have seen these a few times, typically 7mm-12mm.

Glad these are growing so quickly for you.

I got some babies from yellow ones I collected in Tx a few years back - had no success keeping those alive after I saw them in the enclosure though. I have heard similar stories from others when talking about these but cant remember who.

Couple L3s so far:

lol, Might help to inverse those directions, not sure how I managed that.

The one on the right may be E. longicollis and on the left may be E. obscurus or E. hispilabris but those are both sort of shots in the dark. You can find images of those and more species on bugguide.

The substrate holds together and is "clumpy" if you were to shake it a bit but it would not give you moisture if you compress it between your fingers. I hope that explains it...its something you just have to get a feel for. I find a 64oz/.5gal mister and a pair of long tweezers to be the best tools for hydrating substrate, stick wood ground to whatever coarseness you prefer in a bucket and mix while misting occasionally.

I believe these are known to stay with the mother for at least a few months after being born, waiting to leave until just before molting to 2nd instar (which can take up to a year). IME each instar takes 1 yr from then on.

I think Im around a 50/50 mix of oak and cottonwood on these guys, I had planned to use almost solely cottonwood but lucked into a couple nice pieces of oak. Edit: Dumped the largest grub's sub for some photos and it wasnt too happy, lol, here are the L2 photos:

The grubs sub for now is about 90% decomposing wood ground up, that was mixed with a tiny bit of pulverized leaf mold substrate I give most grubs, and then I compressed it into a loose block. I have some substrate mixes that I am planning on trying out when they need to be moved into larger containers, more of the same, some "fermented" substrate, a couple blends of that sort, and I inoculated a couple containers of wood/rice flour mix with oyster mushroom mycelium the other day(my take on kinshi bottles).

So, after my trip to AZ earlier this year I ended up with 4 female L. mazamas. These produced quite a few eggs for me and I have a few L2 grubs already. Here are some photos up through large L1 larvae at the bottom, I will try for some L2 photos soon.

Missed this before, love these patches. Especially the grub!